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David T.C. Davies (Monmouth) (Con): When the Minister says that he has consulted the Welsh Assembly, does he mean that somebody has picked up the telephone and spoken to his close political colleague, Rhodri Morgan AM, or has the Minister encouraged the Assembly to discuss the matter properly? If he had done so, he would have discovered that a majority of the Assembly opposes the council tax re-banding and could vote it down.
Mr. Miliband: I am interested in the hon. Gentleman's description of the situation in Wales. He will know that in 2001 the Welsh Assembly consulted on its proposal to implement a revaluation in 2005. All political parties and the Assembly's Local Government and Public Services Committee supported the proposal. The hon. Gentleman should bear that in mind before he makes such an intervention again.
Mr. Miliband: I hope that the House will agree that I have been generous in taking interventions and I now wish to proceed. I look forward to hearing hon. Members' contributions later.
For the sake of completeness, I should also remind the House of the position in Scotland. The Scottish Executive commissioned its own independent review of local government finance in 2004. The review committee consulted on options earlier this year and will publish its report in the summer.
In debate with my right hon. Friend the Member for Greenwich and Woolwich, the hon. Member for Brentwood and Ongar (Mr. Pickles) said:
"We recognise the need periodically to revalue properties for the purpose of council tax . . . We support the revaluation being made on a regular and predictable basis."—[Official Report, 7 January 2003; Vol. 397, c. 64–5.]
No one should accuse the hon. Gentleman of changing his mind too quickly, because two years later, he said:
"Any council tax system inevitably requires some form of revaluation."—[Official Report, 2 February 2005; Vol. 430, c. 929.]
The hon. Gentleman's boss, the hon. Member for Meriden (Mrs. Spelman), said that
"a property-based tax must take account of changes in the value of the property."—[Official Report, 2 March 2005; Vol. 431, c. 983.]
Her boss, the Leader of the Opposition—for another few days at least—said on 20 February 2005: "You have to revalue." So the Opposition support the principle of revaluation; nothing could be clearer. But in April they decided to argue for postponement. Fair enough.
The Leader of Opposition was clear: on 20 April, he told "Sky News" that his new policy was a postponement of revaluation, not a cancellation. For the avoidance of doubt, he added "for the first
7 Nov 2005 : Column 39
Parliament", when he was questioned about the delay. So I confidently expected the Opposition to support the Bill. After all, they want to be a mature Opposition. They have been told by their young pretender to remember that actions speak louder than words. They have vowed not to oppose measures simply for the sake of opposition.
What could be simpler than voting for a Bill to postpone revaluation? They might even have claimed that we had stolen their policy.But I had overestimated the people who go by the title of Her Majesty's official Opposition. They still take the title literally: they oppose everything. They are addicted to opposition and repulsed by common sense. No wonder that John Stuart Mill called them the stupid party—
Mr. Nick Hurd (Ruislip-Northwood) (Con) rose—
Mr. Miliband: The hon. Gentleman should listen to this, or he will end up going into the Lobby and doing something very silly indeed.
What could be more stupid than an amendment claiming to denounce revaluation, but with the effect that it will go steaming ahead—for that is the effect of the amendment standing in the name of the Leader of the Opposition? By opposing Second Reading, by declining to give the Bill a Second Reading, the Opposition want take the brakes off revaluation. The automated valuation model, which they spent the weekend saying was such a detestation, will be whirring like there is no tomorrow if they have their way.
The Opposition talk about supporting reform, but in the words of one of their Members, they are the roadblock to reform on this occasion. I hope that all Opposition Members realise that if they support their amendment, they will be voting for revaluation to go ahead, and we look forward to reminding them of that in the years ahead.
Sir Michael Lyons has made it clear that any proposals for reform of the funding system raise complex issues, and the Government have agreed that they need to be set firmly and explicitly within the context of a clear, shared understanding of the role of local government and of councils' accountability to service users. It is for that reason that we have extended the terms of reference for Sir Michael's inquiry into local government funding. In turn, we decided to postpone revaluation from 2007. We have recognised that to proceed with revaluation at this time would not be the right thing to do. The Bill, therefore, puts revaluation on hold, and I commend it to the House.
4.33 pm
Mr. Eric Pickles (Brentwood and Ongar) (Con): I beg to move, To leave out from "That" to the end of the Question, and to add instead thereof:
"this House declines to give a Second Reading to the Council Tax (New Valuation Lists for England) Bill because the Bill merely delays rather than cancels the council tax revaluation, applies only to England and creates inequalities with other parts of the United Kingdom; and because the removal of the need for revaluation of domestic properties offers taxpayers no protection against the imposition of new higher council tax bands."
Were I the Minister, given the speculation in the Sunday newspapers about his position as regards the future leadership of his party and given the Chancellor's tolerance of such matters, I do not think that I would have used the words "young pretender" in this context.
However, on that brief note of solidarity with the right hon. Gentleman, I congratulate him, because only the last Blairite on the Government Benches could have delivered that speech with a straight face. It was nothing more than a panic attack—nothing more than the fear of wipeout at next May's elections. The Prime Minister's credibility is apparently at stake, and his credibility is so low that he fears the result that the electorate will produce in May.
Postponement is not cancellation. I hope that I am not doing the Minister an injustice, but, frankly, to describe the reason for the postponement as a success of local area arrangements strikes me as stretching credulity. There is little doubt that the right hon. Gentleman is regarded as the Prime Minister's plenipotentiary on earth. So let us just have a touch of reality. For the convenience of the House, I have managed to collect the reaction of the specialist press to the right hon. Gentleman's announcement.
I have here a very nice photograph of the right hon. Gentleman scratching his ear from the Local Government Chronicle, which says, "Miliband on the run. Funding reform delay as minister ducks his first tough decision." It continues:
"The announcement was met with dismay and incredulity by many in local government, who said urgently needed reform on council tax has been sacrificed for political expediency."
In a comment piece, which is a bit tough but nevertheless I feel that my hon. Friends may want to hear it, Kerry Lorimer, says:
"David Miliband was in prime ministerial mode, making up in expansive gestures what he lacked in expertise . . . Five months in the job, maybe it's time for the new boy to grow up."
That is a bit harsh, but I felt that I had to share it.
Mr. Redwood: I wonder whether the phrase is not so much "young pretender" as "Artful Dodger". Did my hon. Friend notice how none of the good points that he and other hon. Members made were answered by the Minister today? He is obviously on the run in a very serious way.
Mr. Pickles: Of course my right hon. Friend makes an excellent point, and the Minister is blushing as we speak.
Let us move on briefly to Tony Travers—a noted expert—who said:
"There must now be a risk the reform of local government finance becomes the object of near-permanent official inquiry. This issue would have been pushed into the longest of the long grass."
Under a further headline, "Miliband baulks a funding decision", we read:
We have an interesting piece from the right hon. Member for Greenwich and Woolwich (Mr. Raynsford) in which he said:
"There is no case for postponing a review of the system, which is already 14 years old. It is getting increasingly out of date."
There is an editorial piece, "Kicked into touch again", which says:
"Yet ministers have bottled-out of grasping the council funding nettle, and passed the buck to the next PM, presumably Gordon Brown or, judging by their date for the next revaluation . . . a Conservative."
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